Mako Eyes
by Frodo Silverlune
Summary: He'd never been able to hide behind his eyes. But that didn't stop him from trying. Interconnected series of Cloud-focused oneshots set during FFVII. No slash.
1. Tifa

**Mako Eyes**

Note: This is my first FFVII fic (yay!)- a series of connected one-shots from different characters' POV. We begin during the game, and may continue through AC and post DoC, wherever the winds of inspiration blow. Slash/yaoi free. If there's anything in here that seems like slash, let me know and I'll fix it. Um...no language either, but there is alcohol content. I hope to use these fics to refine my writing, so if you have any tips they're very welcome. So are special requests. Enjoy!

**Tifa**

* * *

She loved his eyes.

Maybe more than anything in the world. She could lose herself in those eyes if he'd let her. But now they were closed.

She remembered his eyes when he first left for SOLDIER- sparkling blue, shining with hope and promise. They told her everything she needed to know, that he would come back a man, a hero, that everything she hoped for would magically come true because he would make it come true. When he left- so young, only fourteen years old, still a kid- his eyes were alive and open, bluer than the clear sky over the gray peaks of the mountains around Nibelheim. But not anymore.

When she found him again, slumped over a giant sword on the floor of a Midgar train station, the first thing she noticed were his eyes.

At first she thought it might have been the dim lighting, the cold gleam of the station lights reflecting in his eyes- eyes glowing, shining ever so faintly sapphire blue.

"Cloud?"

His eyes flashed towards her and she knew he recognized her, that yes this was Tifa, his childhood friend, but oh how he'd changed.

"Hey."

That was it. After five years, that was all he had to say to her- "hey."

She had so much to tell him, to ask. She wanted to scream at him for leaving her alone, for never once telling her he was alive, for leaving her alone to pick her life up out of the chaos she'd suffered through. But he looked like he had enough on his plate.

He'd never been able to hide behind his eyes.

So she waited. But oh, how hard it was. Now that he was here (she'd made sure of that), she never wanted to loose him again. But had she really found him?

He was so different. Looking back now, she wonders how she hadn't guessed the truth sooner. So many times she'd almost asked him, or said something, because this cold, apathetic shell he'd squeezed himself into was so foreign and so wrong.

She saw the doubt.

When he thought no one was watching him she would see the glaze melt from his eyes, the mask of indifference shatter into uncertainty, exhaled so discretely in one tiny sigh or one tightening of the jaw, the nervous darting of his eyes as he tried to remember why this was happening to him.

And when people, stupid people, stared at his eyes in fear or amazement (or even worse, pity), she wanted to pin them against the wall and scream at them to never say that again because they didn't know him, they didn't know that every time they asked him about his eyes it drove him deeper into his stone fortress, and she was trying so desperately to pull him out.

He tried too hard, that was the problem. He tried to be so strong, to prove to everyone he could handle himself, that he didn't need help or people or love. But she knew him. She knew how much he craved affection, reassurance, intimacy. So why would he distance himself from them, take his plate of food away from the warmth of the campfire and friends into the chill winds and darkness? Why did he think he had to be alone?

And her. Aeris.

Tifa couldn't help but become jealous. Cloud was _her_ hero. _Her_ friend. She'd been the one who was there for him, but Aeris was the one who was cracking the ice. She should have been glad, thankful the ice was breaking at all, but _she_ was supposed to do it. Not some flower girl who'd only known him for a few months. But Aeris was impossible to hate, so Tifa locked those feelings away and waited for whoever was controlling Cloud's body to leave. Then, she knew, he would be hers, almost as surely as she'd known he would never come back.

But it still hurt. Especially one morning, waiting for him in a hotel lobby, irritated that it'd been an hour and he still hadn't come down. Yuffie's begging to break into his room eventually wore Barret down, but when the lock had been picked and it came to choosing the unlucky victim who would enter the forbidden chamber and wake Cloud up, Aeris had been the one to volunteer first.

Later, she'd told Tifa about her experience, and it had been all the martial artist could do to smile and be happy for her.

"I saw him," was all Aeris had to say, and Tifa understood. She didn't need to know how perfect he'd looked, how beautiful, how much like an angel he'd seemed with his pale, elegant features relaxed in sleep and the soft golden hair splayed across his pillow like a radiant halo. She really didn't want to know how he'd opened his eyes, those brilliant mako eyes and gazed simply, steadily into _hers_. And Aeris told her how breathtaking it was, to see through his blue eyes into his soul, without any walls, without any barriers or self-doubt or pain. Just Cloud. Just him, all his faults and failures, all his noble pride and self-sacrificing nature so fragile and alive like an unborn baby, unafraid and delicate and so incredibly miraculous she couldn't help but gasp.

Her reaction broke the spell, he realized what he was doing, what he was letting her see, and the walls crashed down, but it was too late. He could shoo her from the room, but it was a transfigured Aeris who ran to Tifa and spilled the wonderful news.

And when she died, Tifa knew she'd been happy. Her one wish, her simple heartbreaking wish to see him was fulfilled, and maybe she didn't save the world so much for everyone else as for him, to give him one more chance to live.

She didn't know how much her death would break him.

He blamed himself.

Some things just never changed. Cloud would always blame himself, take the mistakes of others and pile them on his own fragile shoulders. He probably always would. But Aeris' death was a burden to heavy for him to carry all alone.

Alone.

That's where he was now.

"Cloud?"

Tifa gently placed a hand on his cheek, feeling the smooth white skin brush cold beneath her fingertips. He moaned and rolled his head to the side, unconsciously into her palm.

In her seat across from his wheelchair, Tifa sighed and carefully straightened him back out. His neck would get sore dangling at that angle.

_Mako poisoning. _

Tears welled up behind her eyes. More tears? She thought she'd cried everything by now. There just seemed to be no hope. She'd called his name until her throat was hoarse. Begged, pleaded, reasoned…nothing worked.

He was lost.

Gosh, how she loved him.

His eyes flickered open. Those beautiful blue eyes, lost and drowned beneath the tropical green of mako radiance. Not blue. Not anymore. Green. Green and glowing, burning stronger than ever, illuminating the well of unnatural turbulence raging within.

She kissed him. Tears flowing down her face, she leaned into him and kissed him with every beat of her breaking heart, willing him to kiss her back. She would draw him from the chaos of his mind and first his lips, then his hands would awaken and he'd hold her. His fingers would creep into her hair and he would kiss her with all the passion she knew he possessed, murmuring into her ear in his soft, sexy voice.

But he didn't.

She pulled away, holding his face between her hands, searching desperately for any sign of life. Nothing.

A knock on the door. The nurse.

Tifa covered her face with her hands and fled.

Next chapter- Cloud


	2. Cloud

**Mako Eyes**

by Frodo Silverlune

**Cloud**

* * *

He hated his eyes.

From childhood until now, at twenty-one, he'd always wished he'd been born with different eyes. He remembered now- the teasing, the bullying.

"Your eyes are so big they're as big as an elephant!"

"My mom said you never lost your blue baby eyes."

"Baby! Are you crying?"

"Crybaby Cloud!"

And later, when he had learned to fight back, they still didn't leave him alone.

"What's that? You wanna fight? Whatcha gonna do, stare me down with those big blue eyes?"

"Come on! I'll hit you so hard you'll get some black with that blue!"

With the memories came the pain. He wanted to tell himself they couldn't hurt him. Sticks and stones, right? But now the words resurfaced and he felt them, every syllable, every sneer cutting across his mind like a thousand-thronged whip. And with them, new words, recent words, falling like hammer strokes, ringing and reverberating inside him like he was trapped in a giant bronze bell.

_Failure._

_Puppet._

_Weakling._

Failure.

"What's wrong with your eyes, mister?"

He wanted to lash out like he used to, exploding like a little blonde torpedo, knocking out the nearest target and pummeling their stupid fat face into the dust. But he was an adult now. He had responsibilities. And besides, he didn't want to add any more sins to his ever-growing list.

So he willed the pain away and obliterated monsters instead, sword whirling and flashing, slicing and splitting until he was stood panting in a field of carnage. And he would wipe the blood from his sword, from his face, and walk calmly away, leaving his friends (no, not friends, companions) to shake their heads and re-sheathe their cold, spotless weapons. Cloud was showing off again.

Leaning over a tiny steel sink, locked in a bathroom in the Highwind, he rinsed the sour taste of vomit from his mouth.

The poor guys. They'd tried. It wasn't their fault he was so messed up. They'd meant well, really.

"_Welcome back, Cloud!"_

"_What…"_

_Frozen in the automatic doorway, confused. What was everyone doing in the conference room? Why was it decorated like there was a party? And what was this feeling? He was a shadow- a shadow suddenly and painfully blinded with warmth and light. It was unnatural, foreign. _

"_Surprise! Like the balloons? I didn't know your favorite color, so I just picked yellow. Pretty sweet, huh? It was all my idea, giving you a welcome back party. Didn't I do a good job, huh?" Yuffie._

"_Good to see ya back ta normal, spikes!" Barett slapping him on the shoulder._

'_They threw me a party,' he realized._

_They care…_

_He wanted to smile. Imagine that! He clenched his jaw, trying so hard to still the twitching corners of his lips- to solidify the mask, reinforce the walls._

_And her. Tifa smiling sweetly in the corner, arms crossed over her chest, warmth radiating from her beautiful brown eyes, happy. _

_Uncertain. He didn't deserve this. Not after all he'd done. He'd probably just singlehandedly brought about the end of all life, and here they were thanking him for it._

'_But they threw me a party.'_

_Somehow they still wanted him around. Why? He wasn't anyone special. No real talents, humorless, negative, weak. Failure._

_And just in the middle of a good self-berating, Cid dramatically pulled a napkin off a cake. A cake with his name on it. There it was- written across the frosted white top in blue icing- 'Welcome back Cloud!'_

_Pain._

_Too much. He didn't know what to do. He was cracking. Breaking. The shell would shatter and his insides would melt into the floor. He was loosing control. Again. But this was different than Jenova. This was him dissolving under the influence of…what? He'd worked so hard to keep himself from feeling this, feeling special. That was it. _

_So that was what was wrong. They were making him feel special. Like he mattered, that maybe he wasn't a complete waste of space and energy, as though they cared about him, maybe even liked him. _

_And as he realized that, he knew how close he was to the end. If he smiled, a real smile, not one of the half-hearted grimaces he used to satisfy people's concerns, their strategy would have worked._

'_But you can't fool me. I know who I am. I am nothing. Pathetic. Weak. Failure. You can't make me happy.' _

"_Thanks guys," he mumbled. After all, they'd obviously put a lot of effort into this. If he played the part right maybe they'd feel like their efforts weren't in vain. _

_But Tifa knew. _

_Even as Yuffie cranked up the music and Barett broke open his stash of beer, as the cake was cut and Cid yelled at Cloud to sit down and hear about their adventures while he was sick, he could feel her disappointment._

_Vincent knew too. _

_He didn't have to look to know the man would be sitting in the corner, one armored foot propped up on a chair, listening to the conversation around him from the depths of his scarlet mantle, crimson eyes softened in understanding. If there was anyone Cloud really wanted to be friends with, it was him. Maybe it was because of the similarities of their past- both imprisoned by Hojo and survivors of his warped experimentation. Or perhaps it was the seclusion and shared awkwardness in social situations. Cloud just felt like he could relate to Vincent, like he knew in a way what was going on in the man's mind without, thankfully, having to say anything, and that Vincent could understand him in return._

_Because as much as Cloud told himself that he didn't want to be seen, there was nothing more in the world that he wanted than for someone _to_ see. Because maybe if they knew what he was going through, then maybe it wouldn't hurt so bad._

_So he sat at the table- the fancy glass no-one-could-afford-this-but-the-president conference table with his cake uneaten in front of him and his second bottle of beer in his hand and nodded at all the right parts, even chuckled once at a joke, the atmosphere stifling him._

_The music was too loud. The sweet sugary fumes rising from his untouched cake were suffocating him, accusing him._

'_You should be eating it. They made it for you. How lame is it not to eat your own cake? How insulting is that? What's wrong with you, why can't you eat it? Just throwing your friends away like that. They're not stupid. They're watching you, waiting for you to enjoy their efforts. Stupid failure…can't even eat a piece of cake.'_

_He didn't deserve this. He had to get out. This was all wrong. _

'_But they're trying to help. It's okay. They wouldn't want to hurt you.'_

_He picked up the plastic fork and gingerly took a bite. Instantly the cake turned to ash in his mouth. Carrot. His favorite. They hadn't made an easy cake like white or chocolate. They'd made carrot cake. With cream cheese icing. How had they even known?_

_Heart wrenching- icy fingers squeezing his chest._

'_This is wrong. I don't deserve it...' _

'_No! You are special. It's okay.'_

'_But I failed. Failures don't deserve cake. They deserve to be punished.'_

'_So punish yourself like the failure you are.'_

_Pain twisting inside him. He stood, mumbling some excuse about still being a little wiped out, and left- ran from the light and laughter, every step a physical blow. Yes. This was what he deserved. Maybe if he punished himself like he deserved, the voices would go away._

'_Stupid. Can't even sit through his own party.'_

_Still there._

_So later, alone on a secluded deck outside where the wind moaned and ghosted through his hair like a dark lover, he drank the pain away for the first time in his life. _

Boy, did he regret it.

He raised his eyes and stared at himself in the too-shiny mirror.

There they were. Those huge, glowing mako eyes. Once upon a time, mako eyes were all he wanted- turquoise green like Zack, like Sephiroth's- the color of the lifestream, of strength. But his eyes had remained blue. Five years of showers, injections, floating in a test tube- despite everything they'd done to him, his eyes still hadn't changed colors. The plunge into the lifestream had turned them green for a while, according to Tifa, but as soon as he recovered, they were back to normal. It didn't seem fair.

They had become to him a symbol of weakness. He knew now it had all been an illusion. A stupid wish. A foolish hope made by a little boy who thought he could be someone.

_Stupid boy. Failure weakling_ _puppet_ stupid _failed experiment_ stupid _failure_…

He clutched his temples, palms stretching the skin of his forehead, trying to quiet the voices. So many voices. Which ones were real? They had all been real at one point. Now their remains haunted the graveyard of his reawakened memory- ghosts pressing around, through him, whispering into his ravaged ears. But they were true.

If he wanted proof of his failure, all he had to do was look outside, at Meteor greedily reaching for the planet with its flaming fingers of death. Or, if that wasn't enough to convince someone, the latest headlines bemoaning the most recent WEAPON-induced tragedy couldn't hide the truth of his actions.

And Aeris…

Cloud sighed and gripped the edge of the sink, watching his knuckles turn white with the pressure. No, he wouldn't think of her now, not her, his greatest failure, his greatest sin.

From outside the bathroom his phone rang. He groaned, fumbled with the lock until it released and stumbled to his bed, collapsing on it in a hungover heap, clumsily flipping open his phone with one hand.

"What."

"Hey Cloud, it's Tifa. How are you doing?"

"Fine."

"Okay, well, are you coming down for breakfast?"

"I already ate."

'_Liar.'_

"Really? Okay…um, well do you want to call everyone together? Talk about the underwater reactor and all…"

"No."

Silence. He covered his aching eyes with his pillow, wishing the pounding in his head would stop reminding him how stupid he'd been last night.

'_Always so stupid.' _

"Um, Cloud, should I come up? Are you all right?"

"I'm fine."

"Are you sure? You sound kinda tired. Did you sleep all right?"

"Yeah."

She didn't believe him.

"Hey, Barret's missing a couple cases of beer, do you know anything about that?"

"You mean to tell me he was keeping track of it last night?"

"Okay, look, I'm coming up. You're not okay."

Fine. If they wanted to know him so bad, he'd tell them. He'd tell them exactly how easily Sephiroth defeated him- one-handed with blood pouring from his side. Maybe when he told them how his mind had broken in Hojo's lab, or how he sat against a rock and watched his best friend being gunned down by snipers to protect him, they'd understand why he couldn't eat their cake.

"Tell everyone to meet in the conference room at 10."

"What? Cloud…"

He hung up.

Next chapter: Vincent


	3. Vincent

**Mako Eyes**

by Frodo Silverlune

Thank you to my reviewers, and if you haven't dropped me a note yet, hinthint feel free! hinthint

**Vincent**

* * *

His eyes were the first thing he saw when they woke him in the basement.

He remembered the grinding of the coffin lid, scraping at his consciousness, dragging him back into the world he'd avoided for so long. And when he opened his eyes, at first he thought he was dreaming.

A young man stood above him, staring down at his very alive body in place where only the dead were supposed to linger. Vincent stared back for a second, mesmerized by the color burning deep within the blond kid's eyes. It had been so long since he'd seen light, since he'd seen color. Long ago his world had become black and gray- now the cerulean blue eyes glowing above him seemed alien. Foreign. Eyes that radiant didn't belong in a place of stone and shadows. Yet they were there.

And with the return of color came the return of hope.

But it was so incredibly hard to begin living again. It was so easy to succumb to the darkness inside him, retreat into his familiar haunt of death and helplessness, of failure. But whenever he tried, one of them was always trying to pull him out.

So they thought they could save the world. A little group of fighters who really wanted to make a difference. All he could see they'd done so far was to irritate Shinra- an annoying flea that just wouldn't go away. He definitely didn't stick around because he thought they'd win. It was only a matter of time before Spehiroth brought the end of the world- because of him, what he had failed to prevent. So why did he stay?

Maybe it was because they were so alive. Yes they were young and naïve, but there was a golden aura pulsing through the center of the group, and he couldn't help but bask in its forbidden glow. Apparently though, he wasn't the only one who felt like he didn't deserve it.

Cloud was crushed.

He'd seen it coming, recognized the signs as one who'd been through that hell before. One blow after another until the great explosion of Aeris' death, and then- the great final devastation of his surrender to Sephiroth, his manipulation by Jenova.

Vincent had been destroyed thirty years ago, but nothing like this. Even he felt sorry for the kid, and that was saying something.

"So that's it." Cloud had finally finished speaking- a record five minutes straight. The silence in the room was deafening, but Vincent didn't have anything to say. After all, what do you say to someone when they have to admit to an identity crises? When they have to stand up as a leader and confess that all along they weren't really in control?

"I…understand if you don't want me to be the leader anymore."

'_I wouldn't,'_ Cloud's eyes said, flashing between opposing emotions: silently hoping to be justly convicted for his treachery, yet pleading to be given a second chance. But maybe Vincent was the only one who saw it. Poor kid.

In the end though, Cloud was still the leader, simply because no one else had been able to do as good a job of it as he had. Detail-oriented and organized, able to analyze a situation in an instant and make a decision, dedicated and hard working. Obviously though, the kid didn't give himself enough credit.

When the vote was cast unanimously in his favor, disappointment had flickered ever so briefly across his brilliant blue eyes. And for some reason, their restored leaders' doubt awakened something in Vincent that hadn't been stirred for decades, familiar but rusted and hardened from disuse. He'd thought it had vanished a long time ago.

Concern.

As the days wore on, Meteor crawling closer and closer, inching toward the end of the world, the new feeling actually grew.

Every morning the circles under Cloud's eyes grew darker, his interaction with people more sparse. He hardly touched his food at mealtimes, when before the blonde would usually trail a close second behind speed-eater Cid. Instead of charging headlong into battle, he pulled back, claiming when questioned that he was just letting them have more practice.

Yet that excuse couldn't pass for the hesitancy of his decisions- if he made any- or the sudden absent-mindedness with which he handled their materia. If the others didn't notice, especially how he was always on guard and growing increasingly jumpy, they had to be blind.

Yet when Vincent finally found him, even he was surprised by how far he'd fallen.

It was a warm night- the kind when even after twilight has sunk over the horizon and the world is blue beneath the white moon the heat of the day has lingered, wrapping its warm fingers around bare toes and shoulders, drawing souls into the comforting embrace of a sleepy darkness beneath the rotating canopy of stars.

The night's beauty had drawn Vincent outside, and as usual he was standing on the deck of the Highwind gazing at the brilliant silhouette of the full moon, when he heard the crash.

Someone had thrown glass against a hard surface, shattering it, and from the direction of the sound, it seemed like that someone had come from the Highwind. Carefully scanning his surroundings, Vincent reaffirmed that he was alone on the spacious lower deck. The thrower must be above. A strange suspicion arose within him, and surprising himself, he decided to take a look.

It was Cloud.

The kid had hidden himself up on one of the observation towers, sitting with his back leaning against the pillar behind him, legs stretched out. He took a deep swing from a dark bottle held loosely in his hand and sighed, staring blankly out at the landscape before him.

From his view one level below, Vincent's heart suddenly clenched. Shocked, his hand flew to his chest, then relaxed as he recognized the foreign emotion. He'd felt the same when Lucrecia had…no. He wouldn't think about that. And this was different. It wasn't betrayal, no. As much as he was fond of the boy, he wasn't like _that_. This was…what? Pity? Sorrow?

Cloud shouldn't be doing that to himself.

But what was he supposed to do? Vincent knew he wasn't good with words, but maybe Cloud didn't want words.

Without really having a plan, Vincent climbed the ladder up to Cloud's perch, trying his best to keep his armor from clinking against the metal rungs. The kid didn't move when he appeared on the platform and stretched to his full, billowing height, crimson cloak fluttering softly in the moonlight.

He watched the blonde's shoulders sigh, and he shifted his gaze from the scenery to his bottle, the blue glow from his eyes reflecting onto the glass ever so faintly. He sighed again and closed his eyes.

Vincent didn't say a word. He stood like a stone, wishing he knew what to say.

Suddenly Cloud gestured to the half-finished case beside him.

"Want a beer?"

It was completely unexpected, but Vincent was getting used to that. So he sat against the pillar and took a beer, staring out at the moonlit horizon and waiting for Cloud to start talking. He hoped it was soon. From the few months he'd known him, Vincent knew Cloud wasn't a heavy drinker for a reason. At the last bar they'd been to before exploring the Northern Crater, Yuffie had spiked his drink- just to see what would happen. That night the group learned it didn't take much to get Cloud drunk, and the experience was something they would carefully avoid in the future.

"You don't have to be here," the kid said.

"I know."

Silence. Cloud drained his beer and reached for another.

"You don't have to do that," Vincent suddenly said, surprising himself yet again. Cloud sighed in resignation and withdrew his hand- a teenager grudgingly obeying his parents. Vincent suddenly realized he was probably old enough to be his father. Maybe even his grandfather. It was a strange thought. Very uncomfortable.

"Sorry," the kid apologized.

"What's wrong?"

Cloud looked at him then, and Vincent could see he wanted to open up, to release some of the poison churning inside. Were his eyes only so open to Vincent? Didn't anyone else see the pain he was in? Or maybe it was because he knew what it was like to fail, for guilt to gnaw at his bones every waking moment of every day, or to be sealed inside a test tube, strapped to an operating table and tortured in the name of science. He knew what it was to be helpless and alone, to be used and dehumanized then tossed away like a broken toy.

'_Maybe Cloud's not the only one who needs forgiveness…'_

"Why did they give me a party?"

"What?" Again, Vincent was caught off guard.

"When I came back from the hospital, why did they throw me a party?" Cloud's already sharp eyebrows knitted together in genuine confusion, his jaw locked tight.

"It was Yuffie's idea," Vincent explained. "She convinced everyone that the group needed some cheering up, to let loose."

"Really?" Cloud sounded relieved, hopeful even. "So it wasn't for me? It was just an excuse to have fun?"

"No…" Vincent hesitated, choosing his words carefully. "That wasn't the original intention, but having fun did become a bonus factor." He looked intently at the kid, trying to meet his eyes. "We really are glad to have you back. Especially Tifa."

At the mention of her name, Cloud grabbed another bottle, twisted the cap off with a bright pop and took a long swallow. Was that it? Had he gotten into an argument with Tifa? The girl loved him, and it was obvious he had feelings for her. So was she the problem?

"That's not going to fix anything." Vincent wanted to snatch the bottle from his hand and smack him for being stupid. He wasn't about to let Cloud waste away under the influence of alcohol. But he couldn't force him to change.

"I don't want it to," the kid said.

'_What?'_

Gradually the truth began to dawn on him. If Cloud wasn't drinking to forget his problems, then did that mean…

"Cloud."

The kid recoiled at the authority in Vincent's gruff voice- his infamous you'd-better-do-what-I-say intimidating Turk tone- as the crimson shrouded man stood to his feet.

"You don't deserve this."

Disbelief crashed like a veil over his eyes, followed suddenly, savagely by arrogance.

'_I'd like to see you try and stop me.' _

Defiantly, he raised the bottle and had just wetted his lips when Vincent struck Cloud's punishment from his hand. The bottle went flying over the side and for the second time that night glass shattered on the rocks below.

His outburst startled both of them and for an instant they stared at each other in surprise, until the intensity of Vincent's narrowed eyes and renewed will crumbled Cloud's remaining defenses. The kid's eyes shifted apologetically to his hands and became extremely interested in a seam in the leather of his gloves.

"Sorry," he apologized.

"Cloud," Vincent tried again, hoping this time his tone was a little softer. "You don't need to apologize. Just tell me what's wrong." He knelt down on one knee, bringing himself closer to Cloud's level. The kid shifted uncomfortably, eyes darting from object to object, but never to Vincent's eyes.

"I…" he began, and stopped.

"I just…" One hand traveled to the back of his neck and he rubbed it sub-consciously, his characteristic sign of indecision. Vincent waited patiently, noticing how Cloud's hair turned silver in the moonlight, framing the delicacy of his porcelain face in fine, breathless tufts- blue mako eyes radiating like two living pools of liquid ice in the darkness. He hated that he was such an artist.

"I…I just felt like…"

Eventually he had to progress to complete sentences. Vincent sat down, leaning against the railing across from Cloud.

"And?" He encouraged. The entire conversation had been extremely uncomfortable and frustrating, especially since Vincent felt he had opened up far more than he intended to. He wasn't one to express his feelings, but there was something about the situation that he just couldn't let go.

"You guys don't deserve me," he finally managed, staring ashamedly at his hands.

"Well I'm sorry we aren't good enough for you," Vincent said evenly, trying a different tactic. It seemed to work. Cloud's eyes shot up in shock.

"Oh no," he exclaimed hurriedly, "that's not what I meant!"

"Now you know how we feel when you say that about yourself."

Obviously the thought had never occurred to him before- that other people would be affected by his self-doubt.

"I just don't see why you bother," he admitted.

Vincent was being pulled too close to the brink. If he let this go on any farther, he might start admitting that he actually cared. If it was anyone else but him, that wouldn't be a problem.

'_Why is it a problem?'_

"Well, I came up here because I…because you shouldn't be doing this to yourself. We need our leader sober and in one piece, and despite your doubts, you're the only one good enough to do the job. So shape up and start acting responsibly."

It was a good thing Yuffie couldn't hear him lecturing their leader, or poor Cloud would never hear the end of it. He wouldn't either, for that matter.

The kid folded his arms over his chest and stared at his knees.

"Sorry," he mumbled again.

"You don't have to apologize."

"Sorry…I mean…yeah. No. Whatever."

The night air stirred in the space between them, swirling and eddying like a river's undercurrent. Ever so slowly, relief began to soften the muscles in Cloud's face. He closed his eyes and sighed- a tiny release of tension and guilt. He wasn't alone, after all.

There was one bottle left in the case. Vincent's merlot eyes narrowed as Cloud reached for it and pulled it out. He studied the bottle for a moment, thinking, until finally he wrenched his arm back and hurled it over the railing. A flicker- almost a twinkle- sparked across his eyes at the sound of the shatter.

"I bet they're wondering what's going on out here," he muttered.

And if Cloud had been watching, he would have seen the corner of Vincent's lips twitch upwards in a smile.

To be continued? Maybe.


End file.
